Development of smart irrigation model for large cultivated area on plantation
Radi1*, Murtiningrum1, Fajar Siti Muzdrikah1, Nadia Umi H.1, Agung Tricahya R.1, Muhammad Farid A.1
1Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, Faculty of Agricultural Technology, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Flora No.1 Bulaksumur, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia
Abstract
Water is one of the elements needed for plant growth. The water is generally supplied from rain. However, non-uniform rainfall throughout the year results in periods where plants need additional water. Besides, surface irrigation system is costly, especially for large area. For efficiency reason, providing water to plantation crops must be regulated. This paper proposes an economical irrigation model for plantation crops. This study uses pineapple plantations as a topic of study. This irrigation model is developed from a drip irrigation model that has been investigated in recent year. Previous study showed that a drip irrigation device has a limited operating range. Therefore, for large working areas, land is divided into a number of plots where each plot is managed by an automatic drip irrigation device. In order to simplify management, all automatic drip irrigation devices are connected a master node which acts as a data and information collection centre. While each irrigation device in each plot acts as a client or slave node. This model has been simulated in a laboratory, where the model consists of 3 slave nodes and a master node. Communication between master and slave nodes is done with a wireless network. The simulation results show that the master can manage slave work properly, can collect the data from the slave, while the slave node can provide irrigation water according to the target conditions.
Keywords: irrigation, smart, plantation, drip, wireless.
Topic: Biophysics engineering